


This Is How You Bring Me Back To Life

by letmesaveyourlife



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: F/M, Martinski, Stydia, Teen Wolf, emotional tether, lydia martin x stiles stilinski, lydia x stiles, stiles stilinski x lydia martin - Freeform, stiles x lydia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-22
Updated: 2016-01-22
Packaged: 2018-05-15 11:58:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,621
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5784502
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/letmesaveyourlife/pseuds/letmesaveyourlife
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Inspired by the promo for 5x14 (The Sword and the Spirit)! Slightly canon-divergent though, in which Lydia is pulled from the depths of catatonia by Stiles and their emotional tether. Also, Natalie isn't present.</p>
    </blockquote>





	This Is How You Bring Me Back To Life

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the promo for 5x14 (The Sword and the Spirit)! Slightly canon-divergent though, in which Lydia is pulled from the depths of catatonia by Stiles and their emotional tether. Also, Natalie isn't present.

       “LYDIA, YOU HAVE TO WAKE UP…”

He came back for her. Lydia's gaze was rooted to nothing in particular but she was still able to see Stiles. Maybe she couldn't quite look at him directly or study the detail of his pale, constellation-speckled features but her eyes were open and she could see him as he settled into the chair by her bedside. It calmed her to finally be near Stiles. To know that he was okay in her absence and that nothing had happened to him during this figurative, spiritual hiatus of sorts in Eichen House and she was unable to protect him. He was here and she felt something stir inside of her at his touch. The tender way his thumb circled her opalescent skin, the warmth of his hand scalloping hers.

      "Your teachers, uh, gave us some of the stuff you guys have been working on. Wanted us to hold on to it for you.  
        I saw something about the, uh, Riemann Hypothesis.  Um,  things like non-trivial zero’s and zeta functions and,  
        uh, a lot of other stuff that goes totally over my head… Maybe you can wake up and explain it to me?"

_I wish I could._

The delicate, vulnerable shell of a girl heard every word. Trapped in the haze of catatonia with her autonomy stolen, Lydia still couldn’t move and appeared as if she were inanimate; sculpted of marble. Sea-green hues glazed over expressionlessly, pink petals closed in a soft line with the rise and fall of her chest serving as Lydia’s only physical indication of vitality. She didn't even respond to her own mother during visiting hours. But Stiles’ words penetrated the muted fog keeping her in the otherworldly dimension of her own mind with an echoing quality and she listened. Lydia wanted to come back. It was like being kept from reality, in a dream where she couldn’t wake up but she was still aware of what was happening around her. She just couldn’t display a reaction. Here, Stiles was practically begging her to wake up and she wasn't sure what would become of her. Would she be trapped inside her own body for the rest of her life? What if she never fully woke up? 

The wistfulness lacing Stiles' voice broke her heart. Deep down, she knew there was a chance that she wasn't coming back from this. That whatever catatonic state the chimera's claws had sent her into could be permanent, and that she might be lost forever no matter how badly she wanted to find her way back. And here he was, the boy she loved and he didn't even know it, beginning to fall apart over her stone-cold stagnation. Beginning to show her how he would feel, what it would do to him if the day she woke up never came. It made Lydia want to hold onto this moment as if she wasn't sure whether or not she would see him again, if the next time she did see him wasn't a figment of her imagination or some sedative-induced hallucinatory vision her mind created or a dream. This was beginning to feel like exactly that — a dream, and she didn't have a choice whether she wanted to come out of it or not.

Somewhere in Lydia's haunted and broken mind, voices began to swirl and fade in and out like static. Voices of the dead, voices of people she knew. Things she remembered, as if a memory were trying to resurface.

_"It's not just someone to hold you under..."_

The frozen banshee couldn’t curl her fingers around Stiles’ the way she wanted to, but she felt the warmth of his hands gently caressing and playing with hers the whole time he stayed by her side and something was happening. His presence coaxed her even more to fight for her life and something inside of her seemed to stir and bloom, spreading throughout her. She tried her hardest to follow his voice, to keep clinging onto it.

      "Come on, Lydia... y-y-you have to come back to us. There's no way we're getting through this without you... Lydia, you have to wake up."

The fragility in Stiles’ whispered voice when his soft conversation turned to pleading and Lydia wanted to cry. She sensed the love in his voice, intensifying her will to live. To come back to him. She listened, feeling the potent emotional richness that poured out of his words and her own eyes began to widen with a glassy finish. In this moment, with Stiles by her side and holding her hand in both of his while talking to her about academic theories and how their friends needed her, Lydia couldn’t remember feeling more loved in than she did right now and it made her desperately want to awaken.

_I want to, Stiles..._

She remembered the last time he held her hands like this — it was in his bedroom, a string of red yarn curled around her petite fingertips and the way he looked at her was magical when he told her he believed her intuition. And here he was, filling in the blanks after the series of events that came after that when she began to wonder if something had changed. But she knew, in this moment that was precious and heartbreaking all at once, that that wasn't the case. He missed her. After all that time, she must have still meant a lot to him. It was when Stiles was almost in tears looking down at her that she knew. She could feel it — he loved her.

Though immobile and unblinking, unable to move her lips or even tilt her head voluntarily, Lydia knew he needed her just as much as she needed him and she could feel herself crumbling inside despite her inability to convey facial emotional cues. Time felt slower than molasses as she lay confined to the small corner bed, gazing into space but her breaths became more quick, her pulse hastening. She felt something start to change. She was even more responsive to his touch. Her milky features slowly began to show expression, her eyes bigger and tearful now.

With that, dainty fingertips gave the slightest twitch in his hand.

         "Lydia?" 

It was like a rushing sensation and Lydia felt herself being pulled back to the organic reality of this dimension after what felt like millions of years with a foot in the surreal catatonic world of echoes and illusions. Honeyed irises flew open, pupils dilating slightly. She wasn't imagining this; he noticed the little spark of a change too and she could tell by the way he stilled when a soft gasp came from parted petals and, finally, she squeezed his hand.

_...Someone who can **pull you back**. Someone that has a strong connection to you, a kind of **emotional tether**..._

It was when the strawberry blonde hesitantly, carefully tilted her face a trifle so that she could finally look at Stiles, _really_ look at him and the luster in those warm whiskey eyes that had watched her so attentively like he was witnessing a miracle that she knew she was going to be okay again. Lydia almost wanted to giggle — she was back. Stiles was able to reach through her nebulous incoherence and bring her back, and she smiled at him like she saw heaven.

      "Stiles..."

The next thing she knew, he was cupping the sides of her face and she ascended from the linen pillow, not thinking twice before modelesque arms slid over his shoulders and curved around the back of his neck. Tears spilled down opaline cheeks as Lydia clung to him, her eyes fluttering closed for the first time in she didn't know how long.

Stiles was surprised, but just as easily melted into it as he held her close with deft digits stroking cascading ginger waves. Flush against Stiles, Lydia nestled her milky visage into the crook of his neck and let herself relax against him. His voice was so soft and low he was almost inaudible. "You had me pretty worried, Lyds," he murmured, warm hands lightly stroking her sides and resting on the curves of her hips before pulling her closer in a tighter embrace. "Stiles, you... You brought me back," Lydia nearly cried, her voice whispery and brittle with emotion. "Thank God," Stiles breathed, pulling back for a moment to brush Lydia's tears from her cheeks with soft swipes of his thumbs. Did this just happen? Did _he_ bring Lydia out of catatonia? It was a divine revelation. 

Lydia leaned into his touch, her expressive eyes filled with the words that hadn't fallen past her lips yet as she looked up at him through her lashes. After all these years, she finally understood what Stiles meant by the 'unspoken connection' he thought they shared. Stiles seemed to take the cue, smiling softly at her. The dingy tiled walls of the asylum seemed to fall and disappear in Lydia's mind; she just wanted to be held for a little while longer. "We're getting out of here," Stiles spoke gently after a seemingly everlasting moment, and Lydia simply nodded though she felt she was already home. Stiles was her home, and slowly the little slice of space between them closed. Lydia found herself inching closer as if it were the most natural thing in the world, emerald spheres half-lidded and her heart beating fast. No panic attacks took place this time when she pressed lush lips against his in a soft, sweet but fervent kiss that Stiles returned with just as much passion, his warm and pliant lips feeling so good against Lydia's it was still almost dreamlike. Only this time, neither party was dreaming.


End file.
